


immunity

by ruche



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Happy Ending, M/M, Modern AU, Possibly Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-02
Updated: 2020-04-02
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:54:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23448877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruche/pseuds/ruche
Summary: Dimitri has beenfarmore sad than he is now.He holds his head high when he walks. There’s a healthy color to his cheeks. He clearly bathed before leaving his apartment, too, wrapped now in winterwear and the familiar scent of his soap.  It is really not all that bad at all. Felix has learned to stomach the worst of his lows over the years.But-- this is what heartbreak looks like on Dimitri.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius, unrequited dimitri > byleth
Comments: 7
Kudos: 127





	immunity

**Author's Note:**

> hi yes i wanted to write a funny accidental confession fic but then i accidentally put a lil sappy heart into it. Unfortunately for everyone I think I’m funny so here this is, maybe i’ll make it a two-shot :>
> 
> literally content warnings for Being In Love With Your Supposedly Straight Best Friend. it’s really like that. it’s very much extremely like that.  
> Also, the content warning for “felix’s unideal impression of mental illness” just in case.

Dimitri has been _far_ more sad than he is now.

He holds his head high when he walks. There’s a healthy color to his cheeks. He clearly bathed before leaving his apartment, too, wrapped now in winterwear and the familiar scent of his soap. It is really not all that bad at all. Felix has learned to stomach the worst of his lows over the years.

But-- this is what heartbreak looks like on Dimitri. Lingering just below the surface, sucking all the life out of his voice and face and laugh. Horrendously obvious despite Dimitri’s best efforts, and Felix can’t say which he hates more, when Dimitri is drowning in his emotions or when he’s _lying_ about them.

It doesn’t matter. Either way, his misery always soaks up Felix’s attention like a sponge.

All things considered, it’s only a recent development that Felix tries to do something about it.

He watches Dimitri dangle a toy in front of a calico, increasingly irritated by the slump of his shoulders, the absent-minded downturn of his mouth. He looks like he’d rather be anywhere else. But most likely in his damn room on his messy bed in the dark, as he largely has been for the last few days. “It really is for the best,” he says, to the floor, and not a single thing about it is convincing.

Felix opens his big mouth. “Did you really think you had a chance?”

Dimitri’s expression tells him he spoke too sharply. He’s no good at this. Cannot think of a way to backtrack, because he did not mean to be cruel, but-- ugh.

Dimitri has spent the better part of his college career in love with a grad student possessing a grand total of maybe five facial expressions. A woman just as awkward-- just as selfless-- as Dimitri himself, who had doted on him far too much in Felix’s opinion. Of course he’d fall in love with her. Of course he’d want to tell her, and of course it’d be a disaster. Felix had seen it all coming from miles away.

“No, I...” Dimitri replies, gloomy, too sincere. All the verve of a man with a crushed soul, and for what? The toy in his hand droops, and the cat bats at it with two paws. “I simply had to get it off my chest.”

Stupid. Incomprehensible. Felix only fights battles he can win. So he doesn’t bother with the sympathetic tightness in his own chest, which he knows will not go away until Dimitri is out of sight. He paid for an hour and he has committed to this, to patching their relationship with his clumsy, painstaking efforts, so that will not be soon enough.

“Her feelings for El were a surprise,” Dimitri says with the most ear-grating monosyllable of a laugh-- too pitiful to describe. “So I thought it would be difficult to face them any time soon. But I wish them all the best if they figure it out between themselves… I won’t be meddling, of course.”

He tries to smile at Felix. It makes Felix want to smack his palm square in his miserable face, but his hands are full of cat treats.

“Just moping for the rest of eternity, then?” he scoffs.

Dimitri’s mouth wobbles. “I’m not… I--I’ll admit I’ve never… I mean, it will take some...” He sighs. His voice becomes so very small. “I cannot simply put a stop to how I feel about Byleth.”

Felix squeezes his eyes shut. Why is he here. Why is he here.

Right, because he’s Dimitri’s one friend who tells him what he needs to hear.

“I don’t know how I’ll speak with her,” Dimitri admits. If he hangs his head any lower, he’ll surely fall over. How does a man of such stature _shrink_ like that? “I hope I can be respectful… You’re right. Why did I _ever_ think it would work? I fear I’ve gone and completely ruined things.”

“Tch. You need to get your mind on the right track,” Felix chides, dropping some cat treats between them. It’s happening again-- his mouth flapping viciously without his permission. “When I was rejected, it hurt, but wallowing just makes it worse. There’s nothing you can do about something as fickle as love.”

Goddess, if only he was more fucking fickle. When he chances a look at Dimitri, hunched over and glum in sharp relief to the cafe’s spring yellow wallpaper, the other man is staring back wide-eyed. Finally, there’s a spark of something other than self-pity and common torment in his eye, and Felix almost wants to keep looking, to be swallowed up in this feeling, the relief that Dimitri can always be reached.

For a moment, he forgets just how he was reaching. Then Dimitri opens his big mouth.

“I thought you weren’t interested in such things, Felix.”

“I’m not,” Felix says, too quickly. A fat tabby brushes up against his shin on its way to the treats. He feels a little sick. “But feelings just…. Happen. I learned to let go, because I have better things to do.”

Dimitri looks down at Felix’s hands. “Like visit the cat cafe.”

“This is for your sake,” Felix says. “Because you look miserable.”

“Do I?” Well, now he can hear the smile in Dimitri’s voice. He looks aside-- he’s dizzy enough already. This man is exhausting. The tenderness of his gaze? Killer. “Very thoughtful, Felix. Whoever failed to return your affections is missing out terribly.”

Felix’s head jerks up. He doesn’t know what his face does in the next few seconds. All manner of uncontrollable honesty, because there’s not much else to give when ambushed with something like that. The queasy heat that’s been building in his stomach ever since Dimitri said he’d confess to Byleth just-- exponentially expands, and expands, and expands.

“Felix?” Dimitri asks. “Did I-- say something wrong?”

“You don’t know?” Felix asks, voice low. “I’ve only felt that way once in my whole life, Dimitri.”

“Ah…” Dimitri’s eyebrows furrow. The worst thing is, he looks so genuinely _apologetic_. “As your friend, I feel as though I should, but I don’t recall…”

Felix recalls:

They’re 15. Felix has just beat Dimitri at Super Smash Brothers four times in a row. Their knees are touching companionably on the couch, and Dimitri is wondering aloud about Sylvain’s _habits_. Felix curses Sylvain’s name for even putting that nonsense in Dimitri’s head at all, and opens his big mouth with a sort of dismissive, irritated--

“He won’t stop telling me things like that either. I don’t even like girls.” (This is before he met Annette, after all, and also before he stopped being a shithead on average.)

“Felix,” Dimitri says, chiding but fond, “you really should give them a chance--”

“ _No_ , Dimitri, I mean.” Felix takes a deep breath. Twists to look at Dimitri, letting the controller tumble over his lap as he clumsily gropes for Dimitri’s hand. His eyes flick from his thick fingers to his chest, in that wool sweater he wears everywhere, looking disgustingly soft. “There’s this… Look, I might be interested in a _man_. It’s… a real pain in the ass…”

At age 15, Felix can _only_ say this casually. But he clutches onto Dimitri’s hand all the while, pushing all his meaning into the press of his grip.

Dimitri squeezes his hand back, hard. It’s warm, too. Felix’s heart stoppers his throat, and he steels himself to meet Dimitri’s serious gaze. Does he always look so-- so _soulful_? Where did this come from?

“Felix,” he says, near murmurs. Felix cannot even decipher the soft tone of this voice he knows better than anyone’s. It’s all drowned out by the sky-high thump of his heartrate. Dimitri is staring, _staring_ , lips pursed, impossible to forget. “You may not want to hear this from me, but there is nothing wrong with homosexuality.”

What?

“ _What_ \-- I know that,” Felix snaps, tongue-tied.

Dimitri is visibly relieved. “Good,” he says, giving Felix’s hand a singular awkward pat. “I may not like men, myself, but. I cannot _stand_ the thought of _anyone_ judging you for who you love.”

Felix does not know how Dimitri manages to sound more sincere than he’s ever been in his life, while also sounding like he’s reciting rote script straight from his stepsister’s GSA pamphlet. Felix is disoriented, in general, as Dimitri pulls his hand away and gives Felix another searching, solemn glance.

“ _Is_ someone giving you trouble?”

“ _No_ ,” Felix sputters-- and while Dimitri looks relieved, again, that he’s suffered no such injustice, it’s like there’s a wall between them. _I may not like men, myself._ For him to proclaim this, so gently, just after Felix’s pathetic, obvious gambit…

Felix identifies the gaping, empty feeling in his chest as pain. He tries to get his bearings, imagining he should grab Dimitri by the shirt and tell him _this isn’t a kindness, coward_ , but he’s paralyzed under Dimitri’s overly concerned stare. He tries to school his expression into something neutral so that Dimitri doesn’t catch distress secondhand and make this entire rejection even more of a fat mess.

“Good,” Dimitri repeats. Fidgets slightly. Opens his big, terrible, kissable mouth _again_. “El... El says the ‘coming out’ process is extremely important... I won’t tell anyone else. I-- I absolutely support you. And I’m really touched you would want to share this with me, although I can’t--”

Felix stands up. “Enough, alright,” he says, fists balling at his sides. “You don’t have to-- to pity me like this.”

Dimitri’s eyes bug out. He gets to his feet as well. “I’d never want--”

“I get it,” Felix says, curt and to the point. Staring at his friend’s chest, holding up a hand. Civil. Though he itches to leave, his pride keeps him dizzily rooted to the spot. “Dimitri. It’s fine. I said I _might_ be interested.”

It is fine. It is fine. Felix knows Dimitri better than almost anyone.

But it’s no surprise he’s been misreading that tender look Dimitri always gives him. The fool is just like that with everybody.

Felix wonders if everybody’s heart squirms, then, like his does. Well-- nothing lost. Felix averts his gaze to the character selection screen. “One more round? I’ll handicap myself this time.”

“Shouldn’t we talk about this?” Dimitri asks, strained. Earnest. His eyes glittering upon Felix again. Cozy, effortlessly, when Felix least wants him to be.

“Take this to the grave,” Felix says. And yes, it hurts like a bitch, and yes, they never mention it again, because for all his flaws, Dimitri can keep a secret.

Except now Felix thinks it’s not so much that he was keeping a secret, as that he simply fucking _forgot_.

It would be unfair to hold this against Dimitri. His memory lapses are painful for both of them. But the moment Felix dangled his heart on the line like a cat's toy truly meant so little to him? Hilarious. For Felix it was _excruciating._

 _I don’t recall,_ he says.

“It was _you_ ,” Felix says, and the vindication of it actually lasts. After all, Dimitri remained his-- his silly _crush_ for-- Felix dares not think of it, lest it flare up like a recurring illness. “You don’t _remember_?”

In the present, comfortable silence of the cat cafe, Dimitri gapes at him.

Felix bristles but keeps track of the point, the _point_. “It hurt. But I didn’t _despair_ , or hide, or let it ruin anything.” He sniffs, not feeling half as empowered as he would like to. “It was hardly the end of the world-- why do you look surprised?”

“I--I believe this is the first I’m hearing about this.”

Felix’s free hand snaps to his temple. No luck in warding off a headache. “Boar,” he says, with a breathless chuckle of disbelief, “You couldn’t even reject me forthright, and then you forgot about it? Was it that inconvenient?”

“Please,” Dimitri begs, _begs_ , “Felix, when was this? We’ve known each other so long, and you’re my dear friend. I’d remember if I ever learned of such a thing.” He looks at Felix warily. “What did you _say_?”

Felix resents the implication. He may not be the best with words, but he and Dimitri have historically not needed them. Up until things got complicated.

Still, he didn’t say anything _wrong_. He rolls his eyes and sets the goodie bag of cat treats aside. Oh, he could play it casual and say he doesn’t remember what he said, but his memory surrounding Dimitri is always so accursedly vivid-- and vindication, vindication, because how did Dimitri go three years not _knowing_? It's failing to grasp rudimentary basics.

So he begins to walk Dimitri through that particular dark spot of his teenage history, all the cringe of it, and Dimitri-- Dimitri _interrupts_ him.

“ _What?_ ” he exclaims in protest-- has enough sense to quiet himself, but he continues speaking intensely. Whispers like a madman. He clearly recalls _now_. “How was I supposed to know, Felix? You just said you liked men.”

“I said I liked _a_ man,” Felix hisses back. “And looked you in the eye! I was _holding your hand._ ”

The cats have vacated the area. Felix realizes he is seated too close to Dimitri on the low, cushy windowsill, their legs almost touching, and all this alone is a hot mess.

“Really?” Dimitri asks after a moment, withered, almost hoarse.

“ _No, I’m joking_.”

“I--” Dimitri is speechless. “I didn’t know.”

“You didn’t know,” Felix says dubiously. He believes him without a doubt, because Dimitri’s lies hardly ever take such a bald-faced form. No, it is much more like Dimitri to bumble and mislead politely, to say _I may not like men_ when he means he does not want Felix, though who could blame him? Felix is almost 20, long past thinking Dimitri owes him a single thing beyond his own well-being.

He sits back with a snort, at peace. “I suppose it’s no surprise you’d never guess.”

Dimitri frowns at him. Clarifies: “But you thought I was aware this whole time.”

Felix is sharply embarrassed. He recovers in the way that only experience allows, gritting his teeth and waiting a long moment before he responds. “It really is fine, Dimitri. I’m not the feelsy sort.”

It is Dimitri’s turn to give him a dubious look. “I think that... is only what you’d like people to believe, isn’t it?”

Fuck Dimitri. Knowing and caring about him at the worst times. Despite Felix’s best efforts. Despite Dimitri being a mess. Out of nowhere, drawing such things out of him, and Felix is left to fidget and itch to run. He takes a deep breath.

“I only mean it must come as a surprise, then,” he remarks, measured, “that _I’m_ capable of empathizing when you’re being so ridiculous.”

“Yes, _you_ of all people, I can’t imagine,” Dimitri says, clearly aiming to tease him but pulling up short. He looks down at his hands. Blushing. “I’m sure you were-- you were much more dignified about it than me, if that is the case.”

Felix grunts. A bit too distracted to even bother with Dimitri’s consolation, both self-effacing and ignorant.

“Really,” Dimitri says, still blushing, blushing _more,_ a boyish red creeping even to his ears. “I had no idea, Felix. I don't know how you could possibly have... Ugh. I know it was forever ago, but… I really am so sorry.”

 _It’s not. It's not a thing of the past_ , threatens to spill over, bitterly-- out of spite? To prove a point?

Because it's a fact?

He still gets heart palpitations looking at the guy, even when he hasn’t showered. Still feels the lurch in his stomach when Dimitri texts him in his silly near-perfect grammar. Almost cried when Dimitri was hospitalized last year, almost cried when he was released, almost had a whole-body shutdown when they hugged for the first time in years. It hasn’t happened since.

 _First loves are just like that_ , Ingrid said once. She’d been talking about Glenn, Glenn who she idolizes, and Felix had felt magnificently doomed.

“I don’t need you to reject me twice,” he scoffs, instead. He reaches up to squeeze Dimitri’s large nose between his knuckles, since he is restless and Dimitri is disastrously prone to spiraling. “Do you get what I’m saying? Did you get it through your thick skull? You don’t need to catastrophize. Your relationship with Eisner and Edelgard will remain only as dysfunctional as ever, and you’re free to move on.”

He bites the inside of his cheek, considering. “And… maybe you’ll get over it, eventually,” he mutters, releasing Dimitri’s dumbstruck face from his clutches. “Your feelings, I mean.”

Dimitri stares at him. Mouth slightly parted.

“Or you won’t. Who knows. You’re pathetic.”

Dimitri covers his mouth when he laughs, as if that could possibly be the most embarrassing thing to take place in this cat cafe today. Felix averts his eyes and feels like a clown. At least he is already at the place he is occasionally dragged to when he “needs to feel better.” Dimitri has taken up enough of his time. And he’s laughing now.

Enough. Goddess. Felix would like to play with a cat.

Dimitri touches his arm, and Felix hates how normal it feels. It’s almost sunset now, and the light streaks just so across Dimitri’s hair and jacket, making him glow. Felix feels tired in a raw, mundane way, as one does when they stand on their doorstep after a long day. Them, this-- it's all just so inevitable.

“Felix,” Dimitri says, warm, and Felix allows himself to feel one iota of _something_ about it, “Honestly. Thank you for talking to me about this. I understand it must have been unpleasant-- sorry…”

“If that’s the case then take it to heart and stop skipping meals.” Felix shrugs his arm away.

“I-- I do feel better now,” he insists, lifting his gaze. What once was pitiful, hard to look at, now has even a twinkle of amusement to it. Still hard to look at, as Felix’s cheeks flush pink, but he’s captive. “I hold your opinion in very high regard, you know.”

“Is that so,” Felix deadpans. Dimitri clears his throat. His mouth broadens into an awkward, authentic smile.

“You do have exacting standards, Felix, don’t you?” He marvels, closing his eye. “We both trust in your judgment of character. Even if it was in the past… if I ever deserved your affection, then I must have been doing something right.”

Felix doesn’t like this joke. Self-reflection looks horrible on Dimitri, as always. As do whimsy and longing.

He turns that look on Felix. Wrings his hands in his lap, and very subtly winces. “Perhaps… I can be that person again, someday. Do you think so?”

Felix scowls. “You’re already that person.”

He surprises himself. It takes virtually no time to voice a lesson that took him too long to learn. It sits, now, burning in his gut with a certainty he can almost take pride in. “Nothing more or less. To me, there's only one Dimitri. Now let’s never speak of this again.”

It is many, many months later that Dimitri leans across the small table at another cafe entirely.

“Felix,” he says.

It is around 7 a.m, and frigid. Felix looks up from sorting out his jogging playlist. Takes a sip of his dirty chai. Grunts in acknowledgment, and Dimitri beams.

“I know we agreed to never speak of that again,” he begins slowly-- doesn’t need to clarify, as they’ve historically never needed words. Felix eyes him with suspicion as he shifts around a too-small chair. He extends a hand, and his fingertips brush Felix’s wrist. “But-- I’d like to… well, can I speak of _my_ feelings for you?”

Felix successfully doesn’t choke. But. He frowns, first at Dimitri’s less-than-immaculate nails, where his touch feels like the only heat source in the city, and then up, where it’s entirely possible that he’s misinterpreting the tender look in Dimitri’s eye.

Intuition says that’s not the case. But he won’t know until Dimitri opens his mouth. Felix inclines his head. “...Go on."

**Author's Note:**

> Why does this take place in a cat cafe? The thought of felix “im trying to be a better friend” fraldarius taking his friends there when theyre sad ………………. bro................ .


End file.
